CONGRESSIONAL RECORD SENATE

(1)

time, and that is not an excuse not to do our work.’’ That is absolutely right. I would ask the Republicans to do their job.

Madam President, on the Zika mat-ter, I would add the following: ‘‘The news from the House virtually guaran-tees that the Republican Congress will provide too little aid, too late to ad-dress the looming Zika crisis.’’

The way things are going around here, the appropriations bills are not going to be finished until right before the end of this fiscal year, late Sep-tember. The crisis will long have ar-rived and we will be talking about cases that exist in the continental United States. It is wrong to wait.

I don’t see anyone here on the floor, so I would ask the Chair to announce the business of the day.

f

RESERVATION OF LEADER TIME The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tem-pore. Under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved.

f

MORNING BUSINESS The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tem-pore. Under the previous order, the Senate will be in a period of morning business until 4:30 p.m., with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

The assistant Democratic leader.

f

ZIKA VIRUS

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, 3 months ago President Barack Obama asked this Congress for funding to ad-dress a public health emergency: com-bating the Zika Virus. I am pleased that this week, 14 weeks after his re-quest, we are going to respond. We are not responding in full. The President asked for $1.9 billion to address this se-rious public health challenge. We are not responding without some theatrics and posturing first, but we are going to vote on some amendments this week, and it is about time.

It has been 14 weeks since representa-tives from the Centers for Disease Con-trol and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health testified at the Senate Appropriations Committee on the dire need for immediate action to combat the Zika virus.

I visited the Centers for Disease Con-trol about 14 weeks ago. By then, they had been able to verify that the tissue samples from miscarriages and other serious health problems coming in from Brazil were linked to the Zika Virus. So there was no question that these mosquitoes carrying this virus had serious public health con-sequences—so serious that the Centers for Disease Control dedicated 1,000 staffers to deal with this issue. That was about 12 or 14 weeks ago.

The President used his authority to come to Congress and say: We have a public health emergency; treat it like

it is an emergency. Here we are 14 weeks later getting around to dis-cussing it.

When I think back in times of Amer-ican history when Congress has been called on to respond to an emergency, there have been amazing examples where partisanship was set aside and people said: In the interest of America, we need to act and act now. Whether we are talking about mobilizing for a war, whether we are talking about re-sponding to terrorism, we have done it. We can do it. This time we have failed. We have failed for 14 weeks. In that pe-riod of time, 1,200 Americans in 44 States, Washington, DC, and 3 U.S. ter-ritories, including over 110 pregnant women, have contracted Zika. Six more have contracted Guillain-Barre, an autoimmune disorder that can cause paralysis and death. Recently, the first Zika-caused death and the first Zika- related microcephaly cases were re-ported in Puerto Rico. In my State of Illinois, 16 people have tested positive for Zika, including at least 3 pregnant women.

Over the past few months, we have learned more about Zika and how dan-gerous it can be. We now know it is carried by two types of mosquitoes. We now know it is linked to serious neuro-logical damage and birth defects in children. We now know it can be sexu-ally transmitted. We also know that the mosquitoes carrying the Zika virus thrive in the warm summer months, which is why this action should have been taken long ago and must be taken this week.

The best way to fight a public health threat such as Zika is to have a strong, stable public health infrastructure in place. That is what the President asked for. That means reliable and stable funding year after year.

Our public health agencies have to be viewed as the first line of defense, just as we view the Pentagon as the first line of defense when it comes to mili-tary and terrorist threats. Our public health agencies are the first line of de-fense when we are speaking of Ebola, the Zika virus, and a variety of other challenges that could literally threat-en the health and lives of innocthreat-ent Americans.

We must ensure robust and stable funding for agencies like the Centers for Disease Control. These invasive problems can pop up at any time. We can’t rally to each and every occur-rence after it happens; we have to be prepared. The Centers for Disease Con-trol is not only the best, it is the best in the world, but it cannot operate without adequate funding.

The National Institutes of Health is working on a vaccine right now to pro-tect all of us from the Zika virus. That is the answer, but it takes time—a year. We should have been moving on it sooner.

We must provide critical resources to the Food and Drug Administration. Their reviewers are responsible for en-suring that any Zika treatments or

vaccines are safe and effective, and in order to ensure the safety of those vac-cines and treatments, they have to be clinically tested.

For years we have heard congres-sional Republicans rail against Federal spending and even embrace the notion of a sequester—a blind across-the-board cut. Case in point: Over the past few months, we have heard Republicans protest, stall, and push back on pro-viding funding to help combat the Zika virus. There have been a variety of ex-cuses for their delay, but the outcome has always been the same: We have lost time in responding to this public health emergency.

For years, those of us on this side of the aisle have been arguing that this approach—one of starving funding and endless delays—is shortsighted and ir-responsible. Yes, we must be good stew-ards of the taxpayers’ dollars, but I would argue that there is no better use of the taxpayers’ dollars than invest-ments in public health—investinvest-ments in the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control, and the Food and Drug Administration. These are investments that prepare our Na-tion for the unforeseen, such as Zika or Ebola, but they are also investments that help us prepare for the foreseen situations that Americans face every day, such as Alzheimer’s, cancer, Par-kinson’s, and diabetes. That is why I introduced the American Cures Act— legislation that would provide our Fed-eral health research agencies reliable and robust funding increases every year into the future.

We are not going to win a war against Zika, Ebola, Alzheimer’s, or cancer if our response is tepid, delayed, watered down, or subject to the whims of political fate. Big budget cuts make a good talking point in a speech some-where, but the results can be dev-astating.

I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues on the Senate Ap-propriations Committee to find a path forward to address the funding of these critical Federal health agencies. There is more to do, and we must do it to-gether. If we don’t do it together, we will pay a heavy price.

This week we will take up the issue. We will be voting on three Zika-related amendments this week. The first,

of-fered by Senator NELSON of Florida, is

one that I fully support. It would fulfill the President’s request by providing the $1.9 billion in needed funding to en-sure an immediate and comprehensive response to Zika. We need to treat this public health emergency like a public

health emergency. Senator NELSON’s

amendment would ensure that the CDC has the money they need to support States in conducting surveillance, vec-tor control, emergency communica-tions, and research. It would ensure that the National Institutes of Health has the money to develop this vaccine, and it would ensure that USAID has the money they need to build up a global health response to Zika.

VerDate Sep 11 2014 00:27 May 17, 2016 Jkt 059060 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 4624 Sfmt 0634 E:\CR\FM\G16MY6.003 S16MYPT1

(2)

I am proud to be a cosponsor of the Nelson amendment. It would provide the United States, as well as pregnant women in many affected countries, with the very best chance of mini-mizing the damage done by the Zika virus. Let’s not be penny wise and pound foolish. Cutting back on this money for pregnant women and run-ning the risk that a baby is born with a lifetime of medical challenges and ex-penses is not a way to save money; it is a disaster for the family and a disaster for our budget.

Then comes the second amendment,

offered by Senator CORNYN of Texas.

This is a misguided amendment. I urge my colleagues to defeat it. Senator CORNYN’s amendment would provide a portion of the funding needed to ade-quately respond to the Zika virus. He picked the number $1.1 billion and said: Let’s take the money out of the Pre-vention and Public Health Fund for America—money that is currently being invested to deal with other health challenges around our country. In order to deal with the Zika virus,

Senator CORNYN would take money

away from other efforts to keep Ameri-cans healthy.

The prevention fund accounts for 12 percent—nearly $900 million—of the Centers for Disease Control’s core pub-lic health efforts, such as lead poi-soning prevention, breast and cervical cancer screening, and tobacco preven-tion and control. Think about that for

a second. Senator CORNYN of Texas

wants to take the money out of those areas—legitimate public health con-cerns—and put it in Zika. He is going to move some of the pieces around on the chessboard in the hope of moving the right one. Sadly, it will endanger innocent people.

There is something else to be consid-ered. His amount is $1.1 billion, and the President asked for $1.9 billion. For

some reason, Senator CORNYN believes

that we can reduce the threat of the Zika virus by 40 percent on the floor of the Senate. I don’t buy it. This is a public health emergency. Reducing the funding for it from what the President requested by 40 percent is playing Rus-sian roulette with innocent lives across America and around the world. Senator CORNYN’s amendment cuts base funding that would ordinarily be provided to the Centers for Disease Control.

We are also dealing with lead poi-soning issues across America, which was yesterday’s front-page story in the Chicago Tribune. All of the lead testing around my State of Illinois finds that areas you wouldn’t dream of—the sub-urbs of Chicago, including some of the wealthier suburbs of Chicago—sadly have too much lead in the water. We know that after what happened in Flint, we have to take it seriously. The impact on innocent children is obvious. Cutting back on funding for that to pay for the Zika virus is robbing Peter to pay Paul.

Lastly, we have an amendment that

will be offered by Senator BLUNT. It is

like Senator CORNYN’s approach in that

it would only provide $1.1 billion, and I take exception to that number. As I said, it is 40 percent less than what the President believes is needed for this emergency, but it would not cut the money out of the prevention fund, so that is a positive thing to say about the Blunt amendment over the Cornyn amendment. This amendment is an im-provement, but still, it is important for us to adequately fund public health de-fense for innocent Americans.

When Dr. Frieden of the CDC tells us how much the CDC needs to fight Zika, I trust the doctor. I do not believe we should second-guess his approach, and I don’t believe we should provide the Centers for Disease Control with less money than what Dr. Frieden says is needed.

That said, I appreciate that Senator

BLUNTis trying.

I hope the initial amendment by

Sen-ator NELSONpasses. That is the

respon-sible amendment to deal with the pub-lic health emergency.

We have seen Zika coming for months. We had the administration’s detailed, comprehensive plan of action sitting up here for over 3 months. The time to act is way overdue.

It is my hope that the Senate will fi-nally approve Zika funding this week and that House Republicans will stop their stalling as well and get to work and do the same. We have lost enough time already.

I yield the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. BAR

-RASSO). The Senator from Alabama. Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I wish to share some remarks and ask unani-mous consent that I be allowed such time as I may consume.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I

ap-preciate Senator DURBIN’s comments,

and I believe there is clear bipartisan support for dealing with the Zika virus. And something will be done on that, but make no mistake—there is a dis-agreement, and our colleagues on the Democratic side, as they always do, just want to add whatever new expense comes up during the year to the deficit of the United States of America.

There are many ways we can save money to pay for new expenditures,

and that is what Senator CORNYN is

talking about. He wants to have it paid-for so we don’t add more debt.

You say: How can that be?

Well, we are already in debt. This year we borrowed approximately $540 billion to fund the government. We spent $4 trillion and we borrowed $540 billion of that. That is a very large number. It is unsustainable, and it is getting worse.

We have to start paying for things that we want to do around here and make some choices and set some prior-ities. That is the entire dispute about this matter, if you want to know the truth about it. There is no way we can’t find the money to fund this Zika

challenge—sufficient funds to do that— within the spending we already have.

NOMINATION OF PAULA XINIS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I wish to speak in opposition to the nomina-tion of Paula Xinis to the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. By all accounts, she is a nice person and has a number of admirers. I don’t ques-tion her integrity. I had an exchange with her at the Judiciary Committee hearing when she came before the com-mittee. I think this nominee has per-haps the most hostile record toward police of any I have seen in a long time. Her background is troubling to me, and I believe it justifies us not al-lowing her to have a lifetime appoint-ment where she is unaccountable to anyone as she conducts her daily duties involving, on a very frequent basis, the appearance of police before her in criminal cases of all kinds. She would even hear cases against police officers for misconduct that may come before her over her career.

I was a prosecutor for almost 15 years in Federal court before Federal judges. I was blessed to appear before Federal judges of high quality who gave the prosecutor a fair trial and gave the de-fendant a fair trial, and that is what we are looking for. I am aware of a lot of Federal judges who have a clear bias against law enforcement and have made the communities less safe, made prosecuting a nightmare, and I don’t believe it is good for the legal system. There is nothing you can do about it. A judge can declare that the evidence is insufficient to convict on his or her own motion which nobody can appeal. That is the final word even though a jury, had they been able to hear the case, might have found otherwise.

Yesterday was Peace Officers Memo-rial Day, and this week is Police Week. We take special occasion each year to remember the service and sacrifice of law enforcement officers and their in-dispensable role in ensuring law and order in our cities and towns through-out the country.

Too often when something goes wrong on the streets today, the media is quick to point their fingers at the police, and that is why we have an im-partial justice system—so that the facts can come out in open court. In my experience, when those facts do come out—and I have had the duty of prosecuting police officers—many more times than not, we learn that the po-lice did everything they could accord-ing to the procedures and that the complaints we heard about in the media and through others are not accu-rate. That is what the facts show us time and time again.

It is critical that we have judges who respect the rights of the accused but also respect the role of law enforce-ment and the dangers they face on a daily basis.

We have a nominee for the Federal court in Maryland before us, and every police officer in the country needs to know where she stands and how she ap-proaches the duties, responsibilities,

(3)

and requirements of the police and how she approaches law enforcement. Will she give them a fair hearing? Aren’t they entitled to that?

Ms. Paula Xinis worked as a Federal public defender for the District of Maryland for 13 years; that is, she was on a paid defender’s staff who defended the criminals who were being pros-ecuted in Federal court, those accused for a whole lot of crimes. There is nothing wrong with that. It is a per-fectly honorable profession, and I cer-tainly want to emphasize that. For 6 of those 13 years, she simultaneously served as a complaint examiner in the Office of Police Complaints for the Dis-trict of Columbia here in DC. During the course of her work there, she heard complaints against police officers for conduct as part of their duties. She heard six complaints, and in every one of those cases, every single one, she found against the police officers.

It troubled me, and I asked her some questions about it. In one of the cases, an officer arrested a man who was loi-tering amidst a group of individuals outside a grocery store while talking on his cell phone. When he was asked to move along, he refused to do so. Then the man became belligerent and repeatedly swore and cursed at the po-lice officer. The officer eventually ar-rested the man for disorderly conduct. On the panel, Ms. Xinis concluded that the police had harassed the man and found the police officer guilty of mis-conduct.

When I asked her about this decision at her confirmation hearing in the Ju-diciary Committee, she said she didn’t even know what consequences this finding might have on the career of a police officer as a result of having this on their record.

In 2011, Ms. Xinis began work with her current 11-attorney law firm in Baltimore, where she focuses her prac-tice emphasis on lawsuits against the police. According to her firm’s Web site, she and two of her colleagues re-cently settled a $5 million police bru-tality lawsuit. Notably, her firm also represented the family of Freddie Gray, Jr., the 25-yeold man who was ar-rested on April 12, 2015, for possessing an illegal switchblade and who subse-quently tragically died in police cus-tody, causing riots in Baltimore, if my colleagues recall. On September 8, 2015, the suit against the city and the police department, in which her firm rep-resented the plaintiff, settled for $6.4 million.

This may have been a totally justi-fied settlement. I certainly believe that any death in the custody of a po-lice officer by any accused is entitled to and requires a thorough investiga-tion. But in a big city like Baltimore, when there is civil unrest and huge public attention, cities are under polit-ical, if not legal, pressure to reach some sort of financial settlement. This was a tragic case. The details were dis-puted. But it appears that some of the facts were not clear, certainly.

The point is, Ms. Xinis has built a ca-reer of dealing with lawsuits against police and police departments and deal-ing with complaints against the police. In every complaint case she heard, she ruled against the police, which, frank-ly, makes me uneasy, as it does many law enforcement officers. When a law-yer sits as a complaint examiner in a case involving alleged police mis-conduct, the examiner—the judge, al-most, in that case—should know and understand the reality of police work and what our people have to do every day to defend us from crime.

I asked her about her findings that the arrest of a loud, cursing loiterer outside a store was police harassment. In other words, the cursing loiterer was OK, but the police officer was wrong.

I would think that someone who has spent their entire professional career in this arena would be familiar with some of the concepts and procedures in policing in cities around the country today.

For example, broken windows polic-ing is well known. I think most people know what broken windows policing is. It is a short-hand way to describe a policy that originally grew and became predominant in New York City under Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and many be-lieve it saved New York City. Crime was surging, disorder was about, the city’s financial status was at risk, and they started a systematic smart meth-od of policing, and the murder rate is less than half of what it was in New York City. The entire city has been transformed.

So here she is judging police officers about how to handle confrontations on the street and how to make our com-munities safer. Shouldn’t she know about these things?

Broken windows policing suggests that when law enforcement consist-ently enforces the law in cases involv-ing minor crimes—not just big crimes but even minor crimes—that consist-ency helps to prevent major crimes. It is proven to work. It is a major trend. Virtually every city in America does it.

Yes, we have people who are out on the streets causing trouble or risks, and they get their backs up and com-plain when anybody says anything to them. Police officers have to use judg-ment. But this police officer, to me, did what one would normally expect him to do. He certainly didn’t need to be charged and convicted of harassment.

Her statement that she did not know what ‘‘broken windows’’ was and was not familiar with it I think evidenced a real lack of understanding.

There is concern about this appoint-ment by people who have to deal with this every day. Here is a letter from the Fraternal Order of Police, the Bal-timore City lodge, signed by Lieuten-ant Gene Ryan, President. Again, this is the Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police:

On behalf of almost 5,000 members of the Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police,

Lodge #3, I write this letter in extreme oppo-sition to the appointment of Paula Xinis as a United States District Judge in the Fed-eral District Court system.

While on paper, Ms. Xinis appears to be a highly qualified criminal attorney, our mem-bership is urgently concerned about her obvi-ous disdain for the law enforcement profes-sion as expressed time and again through the various court appearances in which she has represented citizens claiming harm caused by police personnel. In fact, her current part-nership in the Baltimore firm of Murphy, Falcon, & Murphy itself is of concern as this is a firm well known in our area for hostility toward our profession and our members and, as a result, we question the ability of Ms. Xinis to remain impartial in any Federal cases involving law enforcement.

Senators, we respectfully request that you give consideration to our request to deny the appointment of Paula Xinis to the Federal bench at this time.

I also have a letter from the Mary-land State Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police, President Ismael Vin-cent Canales. He writes:

As President of the Maryland Fraternal Order of Police and on behalf of over twenty- thousand active and retired law enforcement officers throughout the State of Maryland, I respectfully request that members of the U.S. Senate vote unfavorably on the appoint-ment of Paula Xinis as a Judge to the United States District Court of Maryland.

I believe that Ms. Xinis at this time fails to have the requisite temperament and abil-ity to be fair and impartial on matters that directly affect law enforcement.

And he goes on.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous con-sent that these two letters be printed

in the RECORD.

There being no objection, the mate-rial was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:

FRATERNALORDER OFPOLICE, BALTIMORECITYLODGENO. 3,

Baltimore, MD, May 16, 2016.

TO ALL MEMBERS OF THE UNITED STATES SENATE: On behalf of the almost 5,000 mem-bers of the Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police, Lodge #3, I write this letter in ex-treme opposition to the appointment of Paula Xinis as a United States District Judge in the Federal District Court system.

While, on paper, Ms. Xinis appears to be a highly qualified criminal attorney, our mem-bership is urgently concerned about her obvi-ous disdain for the law enforcement profes-sion as expressed time and again through the various court appearances in which she has represented citizens claiming harm caused by police personnel. In fact, her current part-nership in the Baltimore law firm of Murphy, Falcon & Murphy itself is of concern as this is a firm well known in our area for hostility toward our profession and our members and, as a result, we question the ability of Ms. Xinis to remain impartial in any Federal cases involving law enforcement.

Senators, we respectfully request that you give consideration to our request to deny the appointment of Paula Xinis to the Federal Bench at this time, and any time In the fu-ture.

Most sincerely,

LT. GENERYAN,

President, Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police, Lodge #3.

(4)

MARYLANDSTATELODGE, FRATERNALORDER OFPOLICE,

Baltimore, MD, May 16, 2016.

Hon. JEFFSESSIONS,

Senate Judiciary Committee, Washington, DC.

DEAR SENATOR JEFF SESSIONS: As Presi-dent of the Maryland Fraternal Order of Po-lice, and on behalf of the over twenty-thou-sand active and retired law enforcement offi-cers throughout the State of Maryland, I re-spectfully request that the members of the United States Senate vote unfavorably on the appointment of Paula Xinis as a Judge to the United States District Court of Mary-land.

After careful review and consideration, I believe that Ms. Xinis at this time fails to have the requisite temperament and ability to be fair and impartial on matters that di-rectly affect law enforcement. Based on prior and recent experience, Ms. Xinis has shown a clear bias towards law enforcement which began in her position as a complaint exam-iner in the Office of Police Complaints for the District of Columbia and culminated with her involvement in the civil suit sur-rounding the Freddie Gray Case in Baltimore City, MD. Ms. Xinis is clearly a consummate advocate which we commend her for. How-ever, at this time, I do not believe that she has displayed throughout her professional career a sufficient ability to equitably apply the law.

It is for these reasons that I respectfully request that the Senate vote unfavorably on the appointment of Paula Xinis to the United States District Court of Maryland.

Sincerely,

VINCECANALES.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, Fed-eral judges decide cases every day that have a significant real world impact on our criminal justice system—some-times good, somesystem—some-times bad.

Let me point out this case. It gives an insight into the kinds of things I saw every day as a prosecutor, and it is happening every day right now in courts all over America.

Here is the case before United States District Judge Royce C. Lamberth. He denied a request by the prosecutor for early release of two top associates of Rayful Edmond III, a notorious drug kingpin in Washington, DC. I think they made a movie about him or a film about him, one of the most notorious gang leaders around. The Washington Post described Judge Lamberth’s as-tonishment when the U.S. Attorney did not object to the drug felon’s request for early release. Quote:

The judge rebuked the Office of acting United States attorney Vincent H. Cohen Jr., of the District, saying prosecutors did not give due weight to the criminal history of Butler, 52, the Los Angeles-based cocaine broker and partner of D.C. drug lord Rayful Edmond III, and Jones, 58, one of four top armed enforcers of Edmond’s violent traf-ficking network. The group imported as much as 1,700 pounds of Colombian cocaine a month.

That is almost a ton a month. That is the largest amount I have ever seen. I thought the biggest case I had ever seen was 600 pounds flown in on about 20 plane loads over several months. This is 1,700 pounds a month.

Edmond’s organization enabled drug addic-tion on a scale that until then ‘‘was unprece-dented and largely unimaginable’’ in

Wash-ington, Lamberth wrote, and the harm the defendants caused ‘‘is immeasurable and in many cases irreversible.’’

‘‘To put it bluntly, the court is surprised and disappointed by the United States Attor-ney’s decision to not oppose the present mo-tions,’’ Lamberth said.

Quote:

‘‘The court struggles to understand how the government could condone the release of Butler and Jones, each convicted of high- level, sophisticated and violent drug traf-ficking offenses.’’

So that is a Federal judge doing their duty. I am not sure where Ms. Xinis would be on this.

Contrast that with many courts across the country that are currently rubberstamping motions for early re-lease for Federal drug trafficking fel-ons under the Sentencing Commis-sion’s reductions to the sentencing guidelines that have already occurred and that are impacting the prison pop-ulation significantly, as we will see. That is according to an October 2015 ar-ticle in the Los Angeles Times entitled ‘‘The face of the federal prison release: A heavy dose of meth, crack, and co-caine.’’

This is what the article says:

A federal analysis of the expected impact of the first wave of those approved for early release shows 663 prisoners from California had filed for shorter sentences as of late July. Federal judges denied 92 of them.

It looks as though six out of seven were granted.

According to an October 2015 article regarding offenders released in the Pittsburgh area, the U.S. Attorney’s Office there ‘‘erred on the side of grant-ing’’ the motions.

So the U.S. attorney’s office is not defending the legitimate, original sen-tence that was imposed. They walk in and just don’t—if there is any doubt about it, they just go along with the prisoner’s request.

According to a November 2015 article entitled ‘‘Upstate NY gang members on secret list of 6,000 freed early from pris-on,’’ it is happening in New York too.

Quote:

In the Northern District of New York, the [Court, prosecutors, and defense attorneys] agreed on the eligibility of almost all of the inmates, and disagreed on only five cases that became subject to litigation. . . . Of those five cases, a judge ordered early re-lease for three and rejected one. A fifth case is pending.

So out of all the cases, only one was rejected.

Judges have a duty to make sure that they—they don’t have to take every-thing the prosecutor says. The pros-ecutor sometimes asks for a higher sentence than a judge wants to give, but a judge is equally required to reject a prosecutor’s failure to oppose un-justified reductions.

This is, frankly, President Obama’s policy, and the policy of the Attorney General, whom he has appointed—Lo-retta Lynch and Eric Holder before her—basically to cut people’s sentences that have been lawfully imposed throughout this country. In my

opin-ion, it is impacting public safety and will continue to do so in the future.

Judges must protect the rights of the accused, absolutely, and give them a fair hearing, as they are required to do, but they must give the people, the po-lice, and the prosecutor the right to a fair trial also. These kind of cases cause concern about who is protecting the public. Would Judge Xinis be more likely to follow the pattern of Judge Royce Lamberth in saying no or go along with these other cases?

Over the past year, our law enforce-ment officers across the country have been shot at, assaulted, and murdered, too often simply because they wear a badge. Last year we lost 123 police offi-cers—35 in the first 4 months of 2016. Violent crime and murders have in-creased across the country at alarming rates.

Let me share with my colleagues some of the things we are seeing in trends in violent crime. Recently, the Major Cities Chiefs Police Association, a long-established group, called an emergency meeting to deal with the numbers I am going to share with you today. The numbers I will quote rep-resent the percentage of increase in total murders in the first quarter of this year, 2016, over the first quarter of 2015: Las Vegas, 82 percent increase; Dallas, TX, 73 percent increase; Chi-cago, 70 percent; Jacksonville, FL, 67 percent; Newark, NJ, 60 percent in-crease; Miami-Dade, 38 percent; Los Angeles, 33 percent; Atlanta, 20 per-cent; Baltimore, 10 percent. These are substantial increases in crime.

The FBI Director, Mr. Comey, a long- term experienced law officer, who served at the top of the Department of Justice as a prosecutor, recently said he believes the pushback on police offi-cers—this trend of attacking and blam-ing police officers—has caused some drawback and reluctance of police offi-cers to take on situations like the guy at the store standing out front that was cursing the police officer. Properly handled, those kinds of things reduce crime. They help violence not to start. Once it gets started, bad things can happen. Oftentimes, somebody gets killed. It is not like on television where somebody punches somebody and they get up and walk away and laugh about it. A good punch breaks teeth, jaws, and can kill. This increase in murder rates is significant, and we have to be aware of it. Lives are at stake, many innocent people. If we get off the right path, we will lose lives as a result of criminal conduct.

Think about some of the cases, such as that of Kate Steinle in California, who was out with her father and was murdered by an illegal immigrant who had been deported multiple times. Judges have to know this isn’t a game. We don’t want to put anybody in jail, but if we don’t maintain order in cities, chaos can result, innocent people will die, and prosperity will be reduced.

According to the FBI statistics re-leased just this year, the number of

VerDate Sep 11 2014 02:13 May 17, 2016 Jkt 059060 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 4624 Sfmt 0634 E:\CR\FM\A16MY6.004 S16MYPT1

(5)

violent crimes committed across the country was up in the first half of 2015 compared to the same period of 2014. The number of murders, rapes, as-saults, and robberies were up all over the first 6 months of 2015. There was a 6.2-percent increase in murder. Violent crime across America rose 5.3 percent in large cities, and overall violent crime increased 1.7 percent, an increase that followed two consecutive years of decline.

In my judgment, what I am seeing is this is a long-term trend. I think we will continue to see this increase. I wish it weren’t so, but I am afraid it is. According to statistics released Friday by the Major Cities Chiefs Police Asso-ciation, the number of homicides in-creased in the first months of 2016 in more than two dozen major cities. The Washington Post reports ‘‘the numbers were particularly grim for a handful of places—Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas and Las Vegas—where the numbers of homicides increased in the first three months of 2016. . . . ’’

The article goes on to quote FBI Di-rector Comey. He said:

I was very worried about it last fall, and I am in many ways more worried, because the numbers are not only going up, they’re con-tinuing to go up in most of those cities fast-er than they wfast-ere going up last year. Some-thing is happening. I don’t know what the answer is, but holy cow, do we have a prob-lem.

He also said before our committee that he remembered the last crime-wave in the seventies and the sixties and how enforcement brought it down dramatically. He said we don’t want to forget the lessons we learned pre-viously. Director Comey has further suggested that possible explanations for this spike in violent crime included gang and drug violence. He has also suggested that greater scrutiny of po-lice as they do their duty has possibly changed the way officers and commu-nities interact, something he calls the ‘‘viral video effect,’’ which he believes leads to less aggressive policing. Less aggressive policing means more crime and more deaths.

On Mother’s Day weekend in Chi-cago, more than 50 people were shot be-tween Friday afternoon and early

Mon-day. During a 31_{⁄2-hour period early}

Saturday, one man was killed and 14 others wounded, as the Chicago Trib-une said, ‘‘the equivalent of someone being shot every 14 minutes.’’

According to the Tribune, Police Su-perintendent Eddie Johnson ‘‘saved his harshest criticism for a criminal jus-tice system that he said isn’t putting away the city’s most dangerous offend-ers for long enough periods. ‘Until we have real truth in sentencing and hold these offenders accountable, this will be the unfortunate reality in the city of Chicago.’ ’’

According to an article in the Wash-ington Post, April 2 of this year, ‘‘vio-lence is occurring at levels unseen for years [in Chicago]. In the first quarter of 2016, 141 people were killed, up from

82 last year, according to police depart-ment data. The number of shootings surged to 677 from 359 a year earlier. The city is on track to have more than 500 killings this year, which would make this just the third year since 2004 that Chicago topped that figure.’’

Some say we have too many people in prison. We have heard that. It is cer-tainly our responsibility, in part, in Congress, to set sentencing laws that are smart, that protect the public, don’t put too many people in jail, and strike the right balance.

In the early to mid-1980s, Congress passed, in a bipartisan, overwhelming vote, mandatory minimum sentences and sentencing guidelines. They al-lowed dangerous people to be denied bail on appeal. They allowed people who made frivolous appeals—for the judge to assert that there was no sub-stantial basis for the appeal and he could leave them in jail while they made their appeals because too many people were filing for appeals just to stay out of jail and committed crimes while they were out. All of these are great reforms. They are now under sys-temic attack. During that entire period of time, the crime rate in America went down. The murder rate in the late nineties was half what it was in 1980. How many good people are alive today because of this improvement in law en-forcement? We ended the revolving door, where people were arrested, re-leased, arrested. They came in another time and they are arrested and then they would get out and murder some-body. It was happening all the time. We didn’t have the jail capacity to put the people in jail. We didn’t have enough police to deal with the surging crime rate. When you have 20-, 30-, 40-percent increases in crime, you are talking about doubling the crime and murder rate in America in 2 or 3 years, after we spent 20 years bringing it down by half.

We have to be sure that what we are doing, colleagues, is smart, and we are not signing death warrants for thou-sands of American innocent citizens.

Well, what is the prison situation today? Is the population going up? Ac-cording to the Bureau of Justice Sta-tistics, the rate of imprisonment in the United States is at its lowest in a dec-ade. The Federal prison population— 195,914 as of May 12, 2016—is at its low-est level since 2006. Since 2013, the Fed-eral prison population has decreased by over 20,000, and it is projected to con-tinue downward. According to the Fed-eral Bureau of Prisons, the population is projected to drop another 10,000 this year, which will bring it to its lowest levels since 2005. The Bureau of Pris-ons, which houses prisoners, ‘‘projects that the inmate population will con-tinue to decline for the next couple of years, particularly as a result of retro-active changes to sentencing guide-lines.’’

Indeed, the 46,276 Federal drug traf-ficking inmates made eligible for early release comprise 25 percent of the

cur-rent prison population. Admissions to Federal prisons have declined every year since 2011 and will likely decline further due to the Obama administra-tion’s policy directing prosecutors not to charge certain criminal offenses.

I don’t think this Congress has a duty to confirm everyone who is ap-pointed by the President. We know the President has hostility toward prisons. He has directed his Attorney General to reduce prison populations, and that is happening. He has directed the Bu-reau of Prisons to participate in this. He has directed the Attorney General and the Attorney General has agreed and issued policy that rejects Attorney General Thornburgh’s policies when I was a U.S. attorney. Basically, the Thornburgh policy was, if a person used a gun during a crime, a bank rob-bery, or drug dealing, they were re-quired, under the law, to get an addi-tional 5 years’ penalty in addition be-cause the goal was to deter people from carrying guns during the criminal act, therefore, having fewer people killed in this country. It actually worked. In my opinion, it was part of the reason for the decline in the murder rate, clearly. You were required to charge them be-cause the law said, if you carried a gun, you must get 5 years in addition to the other penalties. Now the Attorney Gen-eral tells everybody: Well, prosecutors, you don’t have to charge that; in fact, we don’t want you to charge too much on these kinds of cases. As a result, the prosecutions are down, drug prosecu-tions are down 21 percent, and sen-tencing is down too.

When I asked the Attorney General why the prosecutions of these cases are down so much, she said they are pros-ecuting bigger cases. I have to say that for the last 50 years, that is the excuse that prosecutors use for having a de-cline in statistics. They say: Well, we are working bigger cases. But regard-less if you are working bigger cases, why are the sentencing numbers down? Presumably, she is saying: We are pros-ecuting more serious criminals, but the sentences are going down. We are see-ing from the prosecutorial end a sig-nificant retrenchment or backing off of strong prosecution policy.

A judge who gets a lifetime appoint-ment and is no longer accountable to the American people—or anyone else, for that matter—is not entitled to con-firmation if we have doubts about the ability over the years to treat police fairly and protect the public from seri-ous criminals.

Certainly, it does not send a positive message to police and the community in Baltimore, where she will hear cases if confirmed. Last year was the dead-liest year in Baltimore’s history—344 murders and countless crimes against persons and property.

I believe Ms. Xinis’s record dem-onstrates such a lack of understanding of the reality of law enforcement and the duty of our whole criminal justice system to protect the public as to dis-qualify her from the Federal bench.

(6)

That is why I will oppose the nomina-tion.

I do not believe she lacks the per-sonal qualities or the integrity needed to be a judge or be a successful person throughout her life, whatever job she holds. She certainly has many admir-ers. I am not questioning that, but her record, as I have discussed, indicates an approach to law enforcement that does not justify the support of a life-time appointment.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. LANKFORD). The clerk will call the roll.

The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

f

ZIKA VIRUS

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, over the past few months the Zika virus has not only spread across the Caribbean and Latin America, but it has become a matter of grave concern in the United States.

Although many of the symptoms are relatively minor, Zika has been found to cause severe birth defects in chil-dren if the virus is acquired by a woman of childbearing age who is, in fact, pregnant. In places where the virus has been especially active, ex-perts have found alarming rates of in-fants born with something called microcephaly—in other words, basi-cally a shrunken skull. Obviously, it is a profoundly damaging birth defect. This is due to the mother being in-fected by the virus while pregnant.

As the weather continues to warm, Texans are rightly concerned about the continued spread of the virus in our State because it is transmitted pri-marily by mosquitoes. But it is not just any mosquito but those known to be present in places such as Texas, Florida, Louisiana, and some of the warmer areas. But we don’t know if that will always be the case or whether they will expand their range or exactly how this could unroll.

In fact, cases in 11 Texas counties have already been confirmed, including Austin, Houston, and Dallas. One im-portant distinction in these cases is that they are tied to people traveling to Latin America, Puerto Rico, or Cen-tral America right now. In other words, there has been no confirmed case, I be-lieve, by the Centers for Disease Con-trol of anybody actually being bitten by a mosquito in the United States and having acquired the Zika virus. But that doesn’t mean that it is not poten-tially dangerous, in fact, for the rea-sons I have mentioned, along with the fact that we now have at least a couple of cases of confirmed sexual trans-mission of the Zika virus.

Fortunately, top research and med-ical facilities in Texas have been

work-ing on ways to prevent the spread of the Zika virus and to protect all Amer-icans from its symptoms. A few months ago, I visited with some of those at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, where they told me about their work in Brazil studying this virus. As the world leader in mosquito- borne viruses, their research is contin-ually groundbreaking.

In fact, recently the Brazilian Min-istry of Health announced a collabora-tion with researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston to help them develop a Zika virus vac-cine. They have also had experience when it comes to tackling other large- scale viruses. Last year UTMB was named one of the first regional Ebola treatment centers in the country, and UTMB researchers went on to develop an effective, quick-acting Ebola vac-cine.

When they stressed the urgent need for the United States to approach this virus in a careful and deliberate man-ner, I listened to what they were tell-ing me. I heard a similar message when I recently visited the Texas Medical Center in Houston. They, too, are med-ical pioneers and are working to create a rapid test for the virus and to strengthen mosquito control in poten-tial hot spots. Interestingly, this is one of the most important components of dealing with the Zika virus; that is, mosquito control.

Indeed, we will hear more about some of the EPA regulations that are cur-rently in effect which discourage or in-hibit the ability of local public health units in places such as Houston, Gal-veston, and elsewhere to actually con-trol the mosquito population. We will talk more about that later.

But like the researchers in Gal-veston, these folks at the Texas Med-ical Center urge congressional action so that our country can be better pre-pared to handle this potential health crisis, instead of having to react after the fact. When the cases of Ebola were confirmed in Dallas, I remember very clearly how people felt overwhelmed by the fast-developing situation on the ground, so much so that they really did not feel that they were totally pre-pared ahead of time to deal with it. We don’t want to make that mistake twice when it comes to the Zika virus.

Conversations I have had with these Texas institutions, as well as the Sec-retary of Health and Human Services and the Director of the Centers for Dis-ease Control, the CDC, have under-scored to me the need to act with ur-gency to avert what could become a major public health crisis in this coun-try.

Because States like mine boast a warmer climate and they are in closer proximity to where the mosquitoes that currently carry the Zika virus are located, we will likely serve on the frontline in dealing this summer with this response nationwide.

Congress can’t afford to sit back and do nothing. I don’t hear anybody

ing: Do nothing. I hear everybody say-ing we need to act clearly, with dis-patch, and without unnecessary delay.

But part of what we need to do is to make sure we have a plan in place and that we are executing a plan in a way that maximizes the effectiveness in combatting not only the mosquitoes that carry this virus but also the virus itself. We have to make sure our public health officials on the frontline of search and prevention have the re-sources they need to get the job done too.

Fortunately, tomorrow, the Senate will vote on several pieces of legisla-tion designed to provide addilegisla-tional Federal funding so public officials can handle this impending crisis head on.

The first proposal is from the Presi-dent of the United States. PresiPresi-dent Obama has made a spending request of nearly $2 billion that isn’t paid for. It is emergency funding, meaning that the funding would be deficit-increasing and debt-increasing. Also, the Presi-dent’s proposal to spend $2 billion comes without very much in the way of a plan about how the administration would use the money. I guess they are asking us to trust them, but, frankly, I think we have a greater responsibility to make sure that the money will be put to good use and that we have ap-propriated an adequate amount of money—but not more money than is necessary—to deal with this potential crisis.

The second piece of legislation we will vote on is a compromise package that was negotiated between the chair-man and the ranking member of the Labor, Health and Human Services Ap-propriations Subcommittee in a bipar-tisan and commonsense way. I

con-gratulate Senator BLUNT and Senator

MURRAYfor working through this in an orderly sort of process, and I commend them on reaching an agreement.

Their compromise bill is basically for $1.1 billion. In other words, it is not the $1.9 billion or $2 billion that the Presi-dent requested. They thought the $1.1 billion was a more accurate and justifi-able number.

Unfortunately, the legislation that has been negotiated between the chair-man and the ranking member of the Labor, Health and Human Services Ap-propriations Subcommittee is not paid for either. What this would essentially do is borrow from our children and grandchildren to meet the present ex-igencies of this crisis.

The good news is we have a third op-tion, which I want to talk about brief-ly. It is a third piece of legislation that I have introduced and which is nearly identical to the Blunt-Murray pro-posal, the Appropriations sub-committee proposal. It would also pro-vide a compromise of $1.1 billion in Federal funding targeted toward health care professionals across the country.

But my bill has a key distinction. It is fully paid for. You might ask: Where does that money come from?

When the Affordable Care Act—or ObamaCare, as it has come to be